The present invention relates to means for steering goods and more particularly to means for steering goods on a conveyor.
Conveyors are used to move goods from one place to another. In the process of moving goods on belt conveyors, roller conveyors, and the like, it is often desirable to divert the goods from one conveyor to another, to sort goods arriving from one conveyor onto various other conveyors, to bring goods from several tributary conveyors together onto a single conveyor, or to align the goods on one side of the conveyor. In order to accomplish any of these functions, it is necessary to be able to steer the goods as they move along the conveyor.
Various methods have been used in the past to accomplish some of these functions. A deflector plate has been located at an angle to the movement of the conveyor to push the goods across the conveyor. A device has been used to selectively kick a package or group of packages off of one conveyor onto another. Some devices have used wheels or rollers which can be located at various angles to the normal line of travel of the conveyor and which allow the goods to move by gravity feed in the direction in which the wheels are pointed. Devices of this "gravity feed" type are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,058,567, Oct. 16, 1962; 3,272,298, Sept. 13, 1966; 3,912,062, Oct. 14, 1975; 3,370,685, Feb. 27, 1968; and 2,613,790, Oct. 14, 1952.
Other devices have used wheels or rollers which can be located at an angle to the normal line of travel of the conveyor and which can be driven, thereby eliminating some of the limitations of the "gravity feed" and other devices. It is this category of devices which is most relevant to the present invention. The following U.S. patents disclose steering mechanisms for conveyors using driven wheels: U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,983,988, Oct. 5, 1976; 3,910,402, Oct. 7, 1975; 3,254,752, June 7, 1966; and 3,552,541, Jan. 5, 1971.
The devices disclosed in those patents are generally arranged so that the drive means is separate from the means for supporting the wheels. This results in bulky, complicated devices having many belts running from shafts located under the wheels and so forth. Some require that the wheels pop up to engage the goods being transported or that the wheels be lowered to engage the drive mechanism, or that groups of wheels otherwise be repeatedly engaged and disengaged, because one set of wheels is only used to drive in one direction. This results in requiring many sets of wheels, many of which are not being driven at any given time. Where the same wheels can be driven in more than one direction, the inventions limit the number of directions, i.e., to two. Many of the devices, because of their cumbersome operation, cannot handle goods coming from a rapidly-moving conveyor and require a relatively long time gap between goods.
A primary object of this invention is to provide a simple, compact device to be used in a conveyor, which device can receive a steady stream of closely-spaced, rapidly-moving goods and can steer the goods in any direction within a wide range of angles. Other objects will be obvious to one skilled in the art.